Follow me on Twitter!

Just Keep Swimming

It’s been a few weeks, but as my last post suggested, contrary to the title, I am NOT a quitter. I am simply lacking skills of priority and time management. I struggled in school and I struggle now. Doesn’t mean that I can’t get better.

I was going through some mixed emotions over the past few months where I wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue writing. At least in the sense of writing for a blog. There are many things that can become discouraging when you are any type of content creator (writer, photographer, filmmaker, YouTuber, etc). Sometimes one of the most discouraging aspects of creating something and putting it online is seeing how small of a reach you obtain.

I think of that on a weekly basis. And on a weekly basis, I have to remind myself of a few things.

Think of the people that have reached out to me saying they got something out of my writing.

Think of the people that read your content that wouldn’t have, otherwise. I’m talking about all of you that read my content outside of the United States. Y’all rule!

Numbers don’t matter (most of the time)

Numbers are so easy to get caught on. I can think of many places, such as the church when those who volunteer or are on staff have a small internal breakdown when it seems as if the numbers dropped.

“Why are there so few people?”

“No one is responding to the altar call (or whatever you call your response time).”

“Are we even doing anything purposeful?”

I am having to realize that certain days or weeks will be slow. If you run a restaurant or business, customer numbers will fluctuate. Some videos or songs you created will have fewer clicks than others. Sure, you want to continue to progress in the long run, but the small things need to be kept at small levels of stress. Go to sleep and wake up to a new and much better day.

Look! You actually matter!

The exigency to this post was a YouTube video by Peter McKinnon.

I recommend you take a few extra minutes to watch this video. Those videography skills are indescribable.

In case you want to skip the video (you should be ashamed of yourself), I’ll give you a quick rundown. If you want to get to the main points of the video, watch from 2:00-4:03 and 10:20-12:06. Mckinnon hits on the point that even though your numbers don’t show, it does not mean that your product and creativity are not good enough. It does not mean that you should shatter your dreams of becoming that teacher, influencer, etc. You can do so much with what you do (more than you can think of).

He has Cody Wanner, another YouTuber, on his video who has a minuscule amount of followers compared to him. He wants to prove the point that you shouldn’t stop.

Wanner has a wonderful perspective on the matter, “The magnitude of ‘creation’ is so huge that you can’t put ‘small’ and ‘creator’. It’s an oxymoron… It’s a mindset. It’s not about your followers or any of that stuff. It’s about creation.”

Why I do this.

Any day could be the day that you have someone new telling you that you did something special for them. One of my goals for this blog is to use it as a type of ministry where I hope that I can show just one more person about who Jesus is and what He is currently doing in my life. I want to do this at such a personal level because I want you to understand that I truly care about you even though I may not even know you. If I can help you understand who God is and how He is infallible by 1%, then I have done my job.

Post navigation

2 comments

Awesome post. Thanks for being vulnerable and sharing your heart. God can use your writing to inspire, and even if it just inspires one person at a time, you’re still making a difference in a life, and that’s important. Bless you!